A Palestinian family from Gaza has won a major legal battle to come to Britain after a judge ruled refusing them entry would breach their human rights.
The case saw the Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, fail in her attempt to overturn an earlier tribunal ruling allowing the family to join relatives already living in the UK.
The decision means an extended family of 17 people can seek refuge in Britain under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects the right to family life.
The family includes the parents of a British-based woman, her brother, his wife and four children, one sister and her four children, and another sister, her husband and their three children.
The family’s original visa application was made in November 2023, just weeks after the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7, which Israeli authorities say killed around 1,200 people, and the subsequent war in Gaza.
After their application was refused, the family successfully appealed on human rights grounds in the lower tribunal in April last year.
The Home Secretary challenged that decision before the Upper Tribunal, arguing the ruling should be overturned.
However, Upper Tribunal Judge Gemma Loughran dismissed the appeal and upheld the earlier judgment.
She found there was no legal basis to interfere with the original decision.
The tribunal heard the British-based daughter and her three children had experienced significant mental health difficulties because of the situation facing their relatives in Gaza.
Judge Loughran referred to the original ruling, which found that refusing entry clearance would have consequences “of such gravity” that they were “unjustifiably harsh”.
The earlier tribunal concluded that the public interest in maintaining immigration controls was outweighed by the family’s right to family life.
Judge Loughran said: “I do not find the [Home Secretary’s] grounds to be made out and I conclude that the judge’s decision should stand.”
She added that the refusal of entry clearance had been “disproportionate and unlawful under section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998.”
The case was decided under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects the right to respect for private and family life.
The ruling does not create a general right for people in Gaza to settle in Britain. Instead, it is based on the tribunal’s assessment of the specific circumstances of this family’s relationship with their UK-based relatives and the impact the refusal would have on them.
The judgment is nevertheless likely to attract political attention because it involves the interaction between immigration policy, the Human Rights Act and the UK’s obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp told The Daily Mail: ‘This risks opening the floodgates to thousands of Palestinians claiming asylum here, which Keir Starmer has already said he opposes, due to Labour’s pitiful adherence to flawed human rights laws.
Why should immigrants be allowed to ship in their entire extended family to the UK?
The Home Secretary must urgently appeal this shameful decision to a higher court. We cannot have open borders with huge numbers of migrants exploiting human rights laws to come here or stay here.
This is yet more evidence why the immigration tribunal must be abolished and why we must leave the ECHR.”
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